


a dialogue

by ohraditsem



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Ambiguous/Open Ending, Crying, How Do I Tag, Mental Breakdown, Roman needs a hug, Sanders Sides - Freeform, The Mindscape (Sanders Sides), breakdown - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-02
Updated: 2021-01-02
Packaged: 2021-03-11 00:34:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 741
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28496160
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ohraditsem/pseuds/ohraditsem
Summary: a conversation between an actor and an audience member.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 4





	a dialogue

**Author's Note:**

> Hey!!! It’s been a while, huh? This was so much fun to write!!! I might make a second part to this?? Maybe?? Who knows?? For now it’s it own thing, but keep an eye out if you’re interested!! Love you dorks <33

The soft clinking of boots is heard against the cold hard wood of the stage floor. Enter the actor. His steps are filled with a flimsy charade of confidence and practiced carefulness.

Center stage is illuminated by a single spotlight. The actor hesitates as he places one foot into the light.

He waits.

With a breath, he moves himself so his entire body is bathed in the warm, artificial glow. His eyes sting and he can only barely see the tiny dust particles waltzing across his field of view. 

The theatre is deathly quiet and he is suddenly very aware of his own breathing. His eyes close as the light becomes too much for his senses. The actor focuses on his breath, willing his lungs to expand and deflate with relative ease.

He opens his eyes again and now notices the single audience member. Right orchestra, fourth row, sixth down. 

The actor knows now it is not the first time he has sat there.

His bare hands are folded neatly in his lap, mustard yellow gloves nowhere to be seen.

The actor pays him no mind.

“How have you been.” 

The audience member asks, his cadence soft and curious despite already knowing the answer.

The actor squares his shoulders ever so minutely and looks straight ahead.

“I am managing.”

He says, his voice vibrating across the walls. The audience member hums, seemingly uninterested.

“And how is that working out for you?”

The actor pauses.

“It’s not.”

The audience member hums again, nodding carefully.

“Managing is not feeling. Managing is a placeholder word for falling.” 

The actor lets out a low, humourless laugh.

“Then I’m falling.”

“For how long?”

“Solid ground is a foreign concept to me now.”

The audience member does not respond. 

The actor shifts his gaze to the familiar stranger, a sudden spark of anger igniting in his chest.

“What do you want from me?”

“I wanted to check on you. Is that enough?”

His brows crease into a thick line, small crescent moons imbedding into his palms. 

“You don’t even know me.”

“Of course I don’t.” 

The audience member keeps an air of indifference, despite his knuckles shifting to a pale white from the tension he is forcing upon them.

“You have  _ no right  _ to be worried about me.” 

The actor sneers, his nostrils flaring with a newfound awareness of the situation.

“I am aware.” 

The audience member pauses. His mouth is open yet no words escape.

“Then  _ why _ are you here?” 

“...to ask for a second chance.”

A scoff presses itself out of the actor’s chest, shaking his head in disbelief. 

“And why, perse, would I let you?”

“Because I know that you want it. You want to be right.”

“There’s a difference between being right and doing what you think is right. You out of everyone should know that.”

“I do.”

The actor’s breaths are laboured again, his muscles trembling as the weight of his chest becomes too much for his legs to handle.

“If I trust you, that will go against every single fibre of who I am.” 

The audience member nods, even if he knows the actor does not see it.

“But if you don’t…”

“It will alienate me from the ones I am trying to protect from you.”

“Yes.”

The actor’s pupils expand, a sick revelation washing over him like a relentless tilde wave as his knees finally force him to collapse against the hard, unforgiving wood of the stage.

“I am already alienated. I-I was  _ always  _ separated from them. No matter how  _ hard  _ I tried, or how hard I  _ will  _ try, I will never be like them.” 

“Yes.”

“I’m just confirming to what they want me to be. I am clay,  _ moulding  _ to be whatever they see fit.”

The actor laughs again, this time breathy and exhausted, the world in front of him becoming a kaleidoscope of golden light and  _ lies. _

“I want to be your solid ground.”

“I don’t think I can let you.”

“...I know.”

The audience member gets up from his seat, though he does not move to leave just yet.

“You can’t save everyone. You know that, don’t you?”

The actor looks up, his eyes void of any discernible emotion but full of tears.

“But you? You can. You can be saved. All you have to do is allow yourself to be.”

And with that, the audience member makes his way up the aisle. 

“Think about it, Roman.”


End file.
